An itinerary designed with women in mind, highlighting
archetypes of American style

A voyage into USA elegance from 1890 to 1940,
with a digression up until today. This is but a basic description
of the exhibition entitled "The American woman: Fashioning
a national identity" at the Metropolitan
Museum in New York from May 5 until August 15.

Conceived to celebrate the arrival of the historic Costume
Collection of the Brooklyn Museum at the Met, the review covers
half a century of evolution of female identity in the United
States.

The curator, Andrew Bolton, focused
on the archetypical figures of American style, presented amidst
reconstructions of settings and period images: from the "Heiresses"
to the "Gibson girls", from the "Bohémiennes" to the
"Suffragettes", from the "Flappers" to the Hollywood "Sirens". The
exhibition includes 75 items of haute couture,
some of which have never been displayed over the past thirty years:
Worth, Fortuny, Chanel, Patou, Madame Grès, Vionnet, Lanvin, Madame
Eta, Schiaparelli...